[FRANCE24] The head of French oil giant Total and a former cabinet minister appeared in court on Tuesday on charges related to corruption in the United Nations...where theory meets practice and practice loses... oil-for-food programme in Saddam Hussein's Iraq.

Total, Chief Executive Christophe de Margerie, Swiss oil trading firm Vitol and ex-interior minister Charles Pasqua, as well as 16 other individuals, face various charges ranging from corruption to influence peddling or complicity.

The oil-for-food programme operated in Iraq between 1996 and 2003

Ten years to bring this to court? Any slower and I'd have to bet that Carla del Ponte was involved in the investigation...

and was meant to ease the suffering of the Iraqi people by allowing the country to sell some of its oil, despite the embargo imposed after the first Gulf War.

According to a U.N. report, the programme gave rise to graft on an international scale, amounting to billions of dollars.

#2
Don't know when it ended, but the Oil For Food folks were working out of the Canal Hotel in Baghdad as early as April of 1994. They definitely had a thing going and cared little about the filthy Ameericaans and their WMD inspection regimes (spit, spit, spit). And with Euro frowning emphasis and disgust....we hate you, we hate you.

[DAILYMAIL.CO.UK] Nicolas Sarkozy is preparing to move to London to set up a billion pounds plus investment fund, it was claimed today. If the move goes ahead, the controversial Frenchman will become the latest to escape a potential top tax rate of 75 per cent in his home country.

He's moving to Britain even though Brits are leaving because of high taxes. Rather tells you everything you need to know about Hollande's France...

He and his former supermodel third wife Carla Bruni-Sarkozy would be likely to settle in an affluent district like South Kensington -- so becoming the most high profile Gallic celebrity couple in the city.

But the former president is under investigation for corruption in France, and if he does cross the Channel there will be outrage.

French ex-Presidents are always investigated for corruption. The investigators are usually right...

Details of the planned move were uncovered during a raid by fraud police on Sarkozy's Paris mansion last June.

It came within weeks of Mr Sarkozy losing his immunity against prosecution after being defeated by Socialist rival Francois Hollande in the May presidential election.

Now the hugely respected investigative news site Mediapart reports that the 'first draft' of Mr Sarkozy's London project was found by detectives examining his computer files.

A judge has since made Sarkozy an assisted witness in the so-called Bettencourt Affair, in which he is accused of using illegal cash from France's richest woman to fund his 2007 election campaign.

#2
A lot of wealthy + super-wealthy Frenchies are leaving France to SSSSSHHHHH save their wealth.

Enjoy the next two years while youse can - come 2015 or ASAP after, once the USA surrenders to NAU andor higher levels of OWG governance, THE ONLY REAL WAY FOR ANYONE ON EARTH TO SAVE THEIR WEALTH IS TO PHYSICALLY HIDE OR BURY IT.

Gold-n-Silver Bullion will be needed for use in Deep Space, both as a matter of Accounting-Budget Appropriation as well as being melted + reformed for Spaceship operating or engineering systems.

D *** NG IT, I DEMAND THAT THE US BUILD A DE FACTO WORKING DEATH STAR + STARSHIPS CREWED WID JAPANESE/BLADERUNNER SEX ANDROIDS IFF THE NAU + OWG ARE GONNA TAKE MY MONEY!

Oh wait, the Bammer said "No" ... ...

SO NO DEATH STAR, NO $$$, + NO SEX ROBOTS - ITS TIME FOR CIVIL WAR, CIVIL WAR I SAY!

#4
Wealthy French people don't live in France. They live in London. They bank in Switzerland. They Shop in Singapore. They Party in Dubai. And they invest their money in whatever country that makes them the most profit. (Which usually excludes France, Greece, Great Britton, and the USA).

They do however take extended vacations (usually about 280 to 300 days a year) in France. Of course they never bring their money, or business records, or anything else the French Government can get its hands on, into the country.

Or in other words.... they live a lot like wealthy Americans.

Like the USA, what France needs more than anything else is economic growth. But also like the USA, economic growth will never happen as long as they continue to tax wealthy investors (and their money) out of their country.

[CNSNEWS] Rep. Charlie Yez got nuttin' on me, coppers! RangelCongressman-for-Life from Harlem, who became what 20 terms in Congress turns you into ... (D-N.Y.), speaking on "MSNBC Live" on Jan. 16 said that "some of the southern areas have cultures that we have to overcome" when it comes to gun control.

Rangel was asked by anchor Thomas Roberts whether new gun control measures passed in New York State should serve as models for other states:

"If you're proud of what New York has done, obviously there is not going to be any perfect policy or perfect law that everybody is going to agree on from both sides saying that this is key perfection but do you think that New York, and what has been done in this state, could be used as a role model for other states that would like to enact something of New York's model?"

Rangel responded by saying: "Well I hope so. New York is a little different and more progressive in a lot of areas than some other states and some of the southern areas have cultures that we have to overcome."

#8
According to Albion's Seed, English settlers brought four distinct cultures to America: the Puritans in New England, royalist cavaliers in the south, Quakers in the Delaware Valley, and borderland English-Scots-Irish in the back country. Each has, among other cultural differences, a very different idea of liberty and the relationship between government and the citizenry.

#19
"Cultures that We Have to Overcome' -Like the culture of Ignorance and stupidity called New York, like those who elected such an obvious fraud and scumbag ass like yourself. A culture of love for government and crooked politician whores that lecture people about morality with $50,000 in their freezer. A culture of race wars where You, YOU have blood on your hands. You are the third scummiest member of lawmakers. You should be neutered and stuffed into a prison in your district.

#22
Culture of lower taxes, less government regulations, government budget surpluses, less gun control therefore less crime, more jobs and lower consumer prices at Walmart. Granted, not as third world as Harlem but when you can't stand the liberal cess pool anymore, don't come knocking for entitlements from the "Southern culture".

A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.

Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.

Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.